


Shinigami Women’s Association Christmas to Remember! White Elephant Showdown!

by Khalid



Category: Bleach
Genre: Christmas Party, Christmas Presents, Christmas Special, Gen, Shinigami, rickroll, white elephant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-16
Updated: 2020-07-16
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:54:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25299463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khalid/pseuds/Khalid
Summary: Tōshirō is given a Christmas Challenge.Ichigo is given an unexpected giftKurotsuchi is green.
Kudos: 9





	Shinigami Women’s Association Christmas to Remember! White Elephant Showdown!

**Author's Note:**

> Links to the music references:
> 
> https://genius.com/Unknown-artist-greensleeves-lyrics
> 
> https://youtu.be/dQw4w9WgXcQ
> 
> I do not own the rights to these songs

Toshiro was given a new assignment by the Shinigami Women’s Association: a Christmas play. Fortunately he had a few strings he could pull to get help. 

Toshiro glared as the parade of characters strode across the “casting stage”... each one being accepted exactly as is… it was driving him crazy. 

“Matsumoto!” He grumbled, “what exactly is the theme of this play?”  
“Theme?” Came her typically ditzy response.  
Toshiro gave up. Burying his head in his hands, he barely noticed the next three entrants: Kurotsuchi, Byakuya Kuchiki, and Zaraki.  
The play was going to be a disaster, he just knew it. 

The Christmas revel came and the SWA roped Ichigo to come along. “There will be cultural performances, a party with music, and even a gift exchange. You won’t have to bring one!” Rukia goaded him until he finally threw up his hands in defeat and agreed to go.

Ichigo stared in wide eyed befuddlement watching the hodgepodge of Christmas plays parade across the stage. It started out as a dance of the seasons, ending with Byakuya slicing the scenery to bits with the fall of cherry blossoms.

“How is this a winter play?” He muttered, incredulous.

Then, Toshiro chased Kenpachi (who was wearing a set of deer antlers) around the stage, trying to get a white blanket over him. Finally, Toshiro pulled out his shikai and froze Zaraki’s feet to the stage and covered him in a pile of snow.

When Kurotsuchi appeared on a sleigh, Ichigo nearly lost his shit. The crazy scientist had changed his skin to a vivid green and was wearing a crude facsimile of a Santa suit. His third seat, the extremely frog like Hiyosu, was pulling the sleigh and had a giant reindeer antler tied to his head with a large red ribbon. At one point, the ribbon slid a bit and it was apparent that it was not actually necessary to keep the antler attached.

Kurotsuchi made some crazy speech about how the sight of the characters loving one another had expanded his heart, but ruined the effect by offering to duplicate the effect in any willing party with his patented heart enlargement candy.

After the stage was emptied (and summarily destroyed by Senbonsakura), Rukia dragged the bewildered Ichigo to the gift exchange party.   
The party theme was “white elephant”, and Ichigo could already see how this would be a problem.

“Relax, Ichigo. Nobody’s expecting anything from you.”  
“That’s not what I’m worried about.” He grumbled, but allowed himself to be dragged along. 

Akon had been in charge of the music selection and was very proudly telling Ichigo all the research he had done to find the popular music of the day. Ichigo stifled a laugh as he began to recognize all the YouTube theme songs and meme songs instead of Christmas songs. At one point, Kurotsuchi accosted Akon and insisted on “greensleeves”. Ichigo had to leave the area to keep from being killed by the crazy scientists when the lyrics came on, “Never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down…”

The gift exchange started presently with Rukia as hostess. She was trying so hard to be professional and fun to show her brother how good she is at something while trying to engage Ichigo. In. Everything.

She went into droning detail about the rules of a White Elephant exchange, complete with ridiculous illustrations. Nobody seemed to be paying attention, but nobody seemed to mind that the events hadn’t yet started. Ichigo seemed to be the only person to notice when Rukia started to announce the number drawings. And since of course Ichigo was the only one paying attention, and naturally Rukia noticed this, he got to be the first to draw a number. Eventually, Rukia managed to press a number on every attendee, whether they wanted one or not.

Despite her best efforts, there were only a few gifts officially exchanged, and even they went above and beyond the concept of “White Elephant”. 

Kenpachi hadn’t remembered that part of gift giving meant bringing something to give away. When it was his turn, he cast about confusedly, and grabbed a partially drunk bottle of alcohol he had brought with him, somewhat to the dismay of the squad members nearest him.   
When Kyōraku and Ukkitake’s numbers were called, rather far from each other, they simply shrugged bemusedly. They had already given their gifts to each other.  
When Komamura’s number was called, the package he opened turned into a bone. Whatever he had brought likewise got turned into a bone. Much to his befuddlement.   
Tōshirōs gift turned out to be a bag of candy. Nobody would admit who brought it, and he refused to eat any until Kurotsuchi revealed the item he had brought.   
Ichigo expected Kurotsuchi to present something horrifying, and surprised everybody by presenting a DITTO, the “rockin’, talkin’ kids robot”. The rules quickly became a bit of a fight, as everyone suddenly remembered they could steal gifts.  
Tōshirō himself did not bring a gift, but when the recipient was called, he created a small living snowman to hang around with the person.  
Finally, Rukia called her brother. She had intentionally left his number for last, despite attempting to be so strict with the rules. She had created a “pet” with a rock and some google eyeballs. Ichigo was beside himself, how could Byakuya manage to keep a straight face in response to something that dorky? 

Much to his shock, Byakuya did not in fact keep a stoic face, in fact he was so overjoyed he immediately picked up the thing and began talking to it. He named the rock “marimo” in reference to pond algae balls. 

Ichigo was ready to return home. The party was as stupid as he thought it would be, but he’d enjoyed it despite himself. Suddenly, a voice rang out from the back corner, surprising everyone. They had all forgotten that Head Captain Yamamoto was there as well. Clearing his throat, he announced that it would be inappropriate for a substitute soul reaper to leave a party without an appropriate gift. As the theme was “white elephant”, the head captain thought it only fitting to present their guest with a white elephant of his own. All the Shinigami captains stared at one another in shock. He wouldn’t. Surely he wouldn't… Would he!?!

At the sonorous thump of his cane, the doors to the party hall were thrown open. First Seat Sasakibe walked into the hall holding a rope. Behind him was the most massive elephant Ichigo had ever seen. Not that he had seen a lot. That was kind of the point! 

Ichigo spluttered in shock. “Head Captain, I can't take this!”  
“Nonsense, young man. It is an honor for us to have you here,” countered the old man.  
Ichigo could almost believe the old man was having him on, but these guys were after all rather crazy. “No, really, Head Captain. I’m telling you people would freak out if they saw me with an actual elephant! Besides I don’t even have somewhere to put it…”

At length, the head captain was convinced by the rest of his captains to come up with something rather more reasonable. Ichigo returned with a small statuette of an elephant instead. This one was made by Akon. 

Sometimes, Ichigo thinks he can see it move around.


End file.
